It’s great to have a real chapel to work in, and we use a variety of props to get the shots you need.    It’s hard to get the exposure right on a white wedding dress in a dark environment.

It’s not entirely fair to put untouched pictures of student on here, and we’re usually not brave enough to put pictures of ourselves on either, although Rachel looks pretty good leaning up against the oak doors in this unconventional composition.

And here’s a great picture from a student that really works, and one that, er, doesn’t!  

Have a look at http://diaryofatinyholder.blogspot.com/ – Sian came on our course at Sheffield Park Garden, and obviously enjoyed it.  Thanks Sian – nice photos by the way!

With photography courses at Stourhead, Sudeley Castle and Charlecote Park,  and a gala charity concert in in London last night courtesy of Gray Levett and Gillian Greenwood,  Rachel and Phil are just recovering from a busy old week.

As the weather gets noticeably chillier, Rachel and Phil were really pleased to see that Stourhead and Charlecote have fully-fitted and civilised education rooms, with tea and coffee and heating!  Sudeley Castle has a blazing fire!!  It is hard to concentrate on the pictures when you’re shivering, but these facilities are fantastic and make the whole experience of teaching and learning much more pleaseant.  It’s supposed to be fun, after all.

Last night’s charity concert at Saint Hill Manor was the most oscar-like ceremony we’ve ever attended, up at the front thanks for Gray and Gillian, who own Grays of Westminster (basically Harrods for Nikon, if you’ve not come across it). With music from Chick Corea among many others, Phil and Rachel still spent much of the evening checking out the astonishing amount of kit used by the photographers and videographers during the concert.  Photographers using Nikon D3’s, with some very big lenses (70-200mm looking rather small), and a four channel remote flash system that enabled them to light various bits of of the stage or the audience at will.  The main photographer was over from LA for this, on his way to photograph in Rome.  And all in a marquee large enough to park several submarines in at L. Ron Hubbard’s enormous estate in Sussex.

Gillian very kindly offered to put Rach on the list to buy a D3S (available in the UK in limited numbers), but we’ll have to save up for that one.  The problem with professional Nikon cameras like our venerable D2X’s is that they never seem to wear out!  Rach has one of the first D2X’s in the country (now relegated to second camera duties) but still going strong after five years of hard professional use.

Supercar photographer Peter Hall is a very busy man, but has given us two days of his valuable time to teach car photography at Cars International, Kensington.  Places are filling fast (actually since we started writing this!),  so you’ll need to be quicker than a Ferrari to sign up.  We are offering places at Cars International, Kensington on Friday November 6th and Saturday November 7th, and Saturdays and Sundays through December -March by popular demand.   We are also in talks to sort out some Aston Martin photography on their test track, which is one of Peter’s regular haunts.  If you’re interested Aston Martins please drop us a line, we’d be glad to set something up quickly.

Peter Hall, our man in the string-backed driving gloves.

We don’t do a lot of macro photography, but we thought we’d have a go with the All Yours Photography Wednesday Night group in Worcester.

These were taken with our venerable Nikon D50 and 28-105mm macro lens.  It’s a biro, and a raisin found at the bottom of Rachel’s handbag.  Yummy!

Perhaps we should introduce a diet based on looking at things with a macro lens before they are eaten. Put’s me off, anyway!

We had a lovely day at Stourhead yesterday teaching photography and using the superb facilities.  We couldn’t believe the pictures that we were taking, and our hardest job was shepherding the students back to the learning centre to download the pictures.  Truly an astonishing setting.

Sadly, we can’t post the pictures here because of the National Trust Picture Library rules – but they really were superb – honest!!

Our next course at Stourhead is filling fast – November 2nd – available dates at Stourhead are very rare – don’t miss the chance to capture the Autumn colours at our Stourhead Photography Course.

Even in inclement weather you can still get nice pics at Portmeirion. Actually this is three nice pics from the D50 stuck together.

The tower in the left is actually the camera obscura that we can get access to if we ask nicely – it’s an amazing thing, one of very few in the country (see here if you don’t believe us).  There are doubts at Portmeirion that it’s actually made out of salvaged submarine bits, but you never know!

The white building in the foreground is called “White Horses” – it’s where Patrick McGoohan really stayed when filming The Prisoner, and where a murderer was once apprehended many years before. It still makes a fab place to stay, but they all do at Portmeirion.

Amy has a brand new Canon 1000D (literally – straight out of the box with only a couple of pics on it),  and came on the DSLR made simple course at Portmeirion to get to grips with it.  She did a fine job, and here are some of her pictures – showing depth of field, and revealing that small rovers still live in village. When you look at these please remember that these were taken within first 50 pics taken on her new DSLR camera.

Good stuff Amy, keep it up – and thanks for the unsolicited testimonial.  See you on the creative course!

Sorry about the lack of posts over the last couple of weeks – we’ve been teaching at Sudelely Castle, Ashton Court, Montacute, Crystal Palace – all over really, as well as photographing weddings and families for our regular job.  Phil and Rachel also survived the three wedding weekend with weddings on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  We’ll put some more pictures up in the next few days.  Peter is taking some students tomorrow to the Britcar 500 at Silverstone – can’t wait to see the photos!

Meanwhile here’s another one of Peter’s – the Bugatti Veyron:

Meanwhile we have added some new venues for next year – Pollok House in Glasgow, Culzean Castle on the Ayrshire coast and Chillingham Castle in Northumberland.  More on all these later, but suffice to say we are thrilled to be teaching at all these historic and beautiful places (if a bit frightened of the ghosts at Chillingham).